The David Horowitz Freedom Center is taking out ads in numerous newspapers around the country to give readers a historical lesson on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, in particular the history of the term, "Palestine". This is not what you have been taught on university campuses and in the classroom. I am cross-posting it here. There is a link at the bottom of the ad where you can donate to help finance further ads.
http://www.campsol.com/fpm/israelad.html
Most of what Horowitz presents is true, but so incomplete as to constitute a lie. To begin putting this in perspective, try reading King Abdullah of Jordan's letter to Americans in 1947:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.kinghussein.gov.jo/kabd_eng.html
Now King Abdullah was also telling only part of the truth. But it is a part that must be considered, along with the part of the truth told by Horowitz.
Jewish immigration was permitted by the Ottoman Empire, which, as anyone familiar with "Lawrence of Arabia" knows, was an occupying power hated by the Arabs under its rule, even if it was also the direct successor to the Caliphate.
Then Jewish immigration was permitted by the British government, administering the "British Mandate of Palestine," which is where the name comes back into modern play.
Jewish immigration was viewed, by people already living there, not unlike the way Gary, Miggie, Squid, and others view immigration from Latin America, Somalia, and elsewhere. True, it was "legal" immigration to the extent that the Turkish and British occupiers permitted it. But you could compare the local Arabic opposition to the way the governors of Texas and Arizona view federal government immigration policy.
Most of the post- WW II immigration was "illegal immigration" by British law, but it happened anyway, and for many reasons, we remember the Hagganah operations that made it work as heroic.
But Abdullah had valid points. The Arabs did not put the Jews of Europe in death camps or ovens. Why should their land be the place the Jewish refugees from Europe went? Yes, Jews have an emotional and religious attachment to the land, but that doesn't give them automatic title to it, especially when someone else has been living there for centuries.
There are valid reasons to support Israel now. One, Arab mobs rioting against Jews, at the instigation of Arab leaders, made partition seem like the best solution. Two, Arab armies tried to wipe out the Jewish settlements, and lost the war. Three, Arab governments made Arabic Jewish populations persona non grata, which is why they now live in Israel. Four, there really is not place for all those people who now constitute Israel to go.
Horowitz's denunciation of a Palestinian state is abominable. Given what we have to work with now, as opposed to what we might wish had happened at any given time in the past, the only way to provide those Arabic-speaking people now living in the West Bank and Gaza with a modicum of peaceful settled prosperous life is to facilitate their developing their own state, alongside Israel. The Palestinian Authority, contrary to Horowitz's insinuations, is in practice ready to build such a state, whatever rhetoric about the river and the sea may pop up on patriotic occasions.
If Israel was really smart, in 1967 they would have announced that the IDF had liberated the Arab portion of Palestine from Jordanian occupation, and invited the inhabitants to construct their own government under IDF protection. (According to the UN resolution of 1948, "Palestine" was to be divided, with Arab and Jewish states, not the Arab part turned over to Jordan.) But, that chance is gone now too.
There is, contrary to the Horowitz bluster, a valid legal basis for an Arab state on one portion of the partitioned former British Mandate of Palestine. Jordan, from 1948 to 1967, was merely a military occupying power.
I can always tell when Gary, Miggie, Squid and Findalis are overwhelmed by irrefutable facts. They don't have anything to say.
ReplyDeleteAnony Mouse doesn't either -- because a detailed recitation of relevant facts is no more conducive to destroying Israel than it is to trampling on legitimate Palestinian aspirations.